Is Imagination Christian?

Last night I came across something by accident that really excited me. I think it was one of those divine "accidents," something that God sent because I needed to hear it right about now. Let me back up a bit.

I got hooked using an iPod a couple of years ago, but I bought a little refurbished one without much memory. Which was fine for awhile, but then I filled it up and had to stop acquiring new music. Since I've started listening to audiobooks of late, I particularly wanted more memory so I could download books to the player and not lug CD's and tapes around.

For Christmas, my wonderful hubby and sister both gave me amazon gift cards which bought me a new iPod with 120 GB of memory. Yep, I decided that this time, I'd buy one I couldn't fill up any time soon. (Now the problem, of course, is that my computer doesn't have enough storage space. But that's another issue.)

Anyway, with all that space to fill up, I went crazy on iTunes, and discovered all this free stuff you could download, including podcasts of people reading portions of the Bible daily. I can't even explain what search terms I put in or how exactly I stumbled across a little gem called "The Bible and Christian Imagination," but I had to check it out when I saw the title. My niece and I have been having all kinds of discussions lately about what it means to be a Christian artist, and how we integrate faith and imagination.

This selection turned out to be a speech given by H.T. Wright at Seattle Pacific University's President's Forum (in 2005, I believe), and it addressed those very issues. Wright has such a poetic way of phrasing things that I want to quote half the speech. As a good librarian who respects copyright issues, however, I won't do that.

Today, I'll just tell you how to find it if you'd like to read or listen to it yourself.
If you use iTunes, just search the store for "The Bible and Christian Imagination," and you should be able to find it.

You can also locate a written transcript by clicking here. (It sounds a little clunkier when you read it, because it is a transcript of a person speaking, with run-on sentences and all. Not like the beautiful, polished prose you consistently find in this blog, of course.)

Next blog, I'll tell you more about the points from the lecture that intrigued me. In the meantime, enjoy!